HR Management Chapter 5 Quiz

Contemporary Issues in Human Resource Management

• Book title: Contemporary Issues in Human Resource Management
• Editor: Nicole Dodd
• Contributors: list of authors provided in image

Chapter 5: Managing Flexible Patterns of Work for Competitive Advantage

• Learning Outcomes:
  • Define the concept of flexibility
  • Explore the evolution of contemporary flexibility
  • Discuss the flexible-firm model
  • Explain the impact of smart information communication technology on the workplace
  • Discuss the changing dynamics of the workplace and their impact on new forms of flexibility

The Evolution of Contemporary Flexibility

• Pilbeam and Corbridge (2006) define flexibility as the organization's ability to adapt size, composition, responsiveness, and cost of human resources to meet organizational objectives.
• The concept of organizational flexibility emerged in the 1980s due to deregulated labor markets.
• Numerical flexibility: adjusting workforce size based on economic activity levels.
• Work-time flexibility: adjusting employee work hours.

The Evolution of Contemporary Flexibility (continued)

• Flexibility includes functional flexibility, which reverses Taylorist practices of fragmentation, deskilling, and work restrictions.
• Organizational flexibility is a structured response to evolving flexible work patterns.
• Modern management can develop multiple forms of flexibility.
• Organizations with adaptability and innovation handle change better than traditional bureaucratic organizations.

The Flexible-Firm Model

• The flexible-firm model breaks from hierarchical internal labor markets.
• Critics argue it leads to a polarized workforce with an elite core, disenfranchised, low-skilled, and low-wage peripheral workforce.
• Model diagram shows different groups and types of flexibility.

Technology-Driven Flexibility

• The convergence of telecommunications and information communication technology (ICT) is known as smart ICT, leading to 21st-century workplace shifts.
• Internet connectivity and cloud computing allow work to occur in cyberspace.
• Project teams can be assembled from global workforces.
• The Internet of Things (IoT): exchanging data between physical objects via the internet.
• Big data analysis of IoT data assists in decision-making.

Virtual Work and Workplaces

• Flexible virtual work benefits both sides of the employment relationship.
• From a human capital perspective, virtual work attracts and retains skilled knowledge workers.
• HR departments must develop integrated systems to manage virtual workers.
• This requires reviewing managerial styles, HR development, performance management, culture, and communications.

Job Crafting and Idiosyncratic Jobs

• Traditional job design hires employees for vacant roles with predefined duties.
• Job crafting shapes duties based on the individual's talents and interests.
• Idiosyncratic jobs match individual talents and abilities to fulfill organizational goals.
• These jobs stimulate unplanned organizational learnings.
• Idiosyncratic jobs can improve retention and innovation.

Possibilities and Challenges in Virtual Work

• Virtual work reduces office space costs.
• Difficulty in trusting and motivating virtual workers.
• Implementing policies and ensuring fairness to virtual workers can be challenging.
• Virtual and physical workers can be combined for improved team dynamics.
• Attitudes of managers impact the success of virtual work arrangements.
• Knowledge transfer can be challenging in virtual work arrangements.

Employer Perspective on Flexible Work Patterns

• Employers perceive several advantages to flexible work patterns:
  • Reduced fixed costs
  • Improved staff attraction and retention
  • Quick responses to market changes through adjusting human resources
  • Moving employees between jobs
  • Utilizing virtual workers
  • Outsourcing/offshoring work

Employer Perspective on Flexible Work Patterns (continued)

• Employers perceive some disadvantages to flexible work patterns:
  • Higher direct costs
  • More complex administration and coordination
  • Increased planning and coordination needed by management
  • Communication difficulties
  • Increased training costs

Employee Perspective on Flexible Work Patterns

• Employees perceive several advantages to flexible work patterns:
  • Combining work with other responsibilities and interests
  • Increased job satisfaction and motivation (often due to skills development)
  • Reduced tiredness and burnout
  • Can incorporate employees who would otherwise be excluded

Employee Perspective on Flexible Work Patterns (continued)

• Employees perceive several disadvantages to flexible work patterns:
  • Unequal treatment regarding pay and benefits
  • Reduced career opportunities
  • Limited training opportunities
  • Increased job insecurity
  • Increased stress
  • Challenges to the psychological contract, possibly contributing to lower-skilled workers and work intensification.